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interActivity was a collaborative art system at the Ball State University Art Museum on February 25th 2007. It was hosted in conjunction with the Engaging Technology exhibit run by the newly minted IDIAA.
Links
interActivity
News Items:
Between Two Worlds:Virtuality in Arts and Teaching
IDIA at Philips HighTech Campus during Dutch Design Week
IDIA is now an Upgrade! Internaltional Node
The Las Americas Virtual Design Studio is made possible through a collaboration between IDIA, the College of Architecture and Planning at Ball State University, the Las Americas Network, with the professional firm of BSA LifeStructures. The project linked 11 international Departments of Architecture, over 100 students and 11 faculty in this immersive collaboration environment. The students worked within their prospective studios under the direction of their local instructors. At the same time each student is assigned to an international virtual studio made out of students of different universities under the advisory of several virtual instructors. The roster of virtual instructors is made out of the instructors of all participating studios and a number of professional reviewers who do not have students at their particular location.
The LAVDS is a beacon that not only attracts visitors, but encourages interaction on multiple levels: it is depicted an organic system – a radial configuration of pods or petals -spaces for small group use, and a large group meeting place at the center. A tall mast-like element. The structure relied on configurable interfaces to facilitate large and small interactions. For instance, it could be set up for small critique or large group lecture sessions.
On November 10, the Las Americas Network held the international grand opening of its Virtual Design Studio. “The nature of the tower’s architecture is specific to Second Life. There are no stairs, and dynamic pods and audio bubbles allow groups to meet together or ‘fly’ away to have private meetings,” said dean of CAP Guillermo Vasquez de Velasco.
The project was created on a Second Life island at the Ball State University Instructional Campus. Some constraints designers faced were the 96′ x 96′ x 96′ cubic site, a limit to 40 avatars able to interact simultaneously, 15,000 geometrical primitives. The project required that it celebrate the spirit of the virtual design studio while leveraging technologies and capabilities for the interaction (work and play) of the participants of the LAVDS in ways that have not been possible outside of a virtual environment.
Links
Indianapolis Wish TV 8 Story
AIArchitect: Architecture in Second Life Is a World All Its Own
News Items:
Wish TV covers Las Americas project
AIArchitect: Architecture In Second Life Is a World All Its Own
Las Americas Finalist for 2009 Mira Award
Design Communication Conference Presentation
Students from Ball State University’s Institute for Digital Intermedia Arts created a music video for recording artist Ki: Theory. The entirely animated video for the song Holiday Heart, is the artist’s first professionally produced video for broadcast on popular music television venues. This immersive learning experience connected students to an industry partner, challenged their production skills, and gave them a look at life after graduation.
Links
Ki:Theory
News Items:
Music Video Accepted to International Festival
The IDIA Seminar’s current project focuses on virtually recreating the original settings of various sculptures found throughout the Ball State University Museum of Art. The project focused on scanning five different sculptures using a 3D laser scanner.
This project has allowed Ball State students to get involved with 3D scanning by learning the method, techniques and limitations involved with accurate scanning procedures.
The museum scanning project was initially a way to not only digitally archive a few select sculptures, but to place them in an animated video to visualize the art in their original context, before they found their way to the Ball State Museum of Fine Arts.
Sculptures such as Adolph Alexander Weinman’s “Descending Night” and “Rising Sun” originally were meant to be viewed at the Panama-Pacific International Exposition of 1915 in San Francisco. The students intend to visually replicate that scene along with how the artist framed them for viewing with the help of a Zcorporation Zscanner 700 at a high resolution. Scanning typically takes the class around six hours (for a human sized sculpture). The ZScanner has the ability to scan any object in the tightest spaces and do it in real-time with one continuous scan. Once the scan data is acquired, there are a large variety of mediums that it can be transferred to both digitally and physically. Students then place the models within an animation using AutoDesk Maya. A high-resolution viewer and interactive touch screens are also used to view the models. Students are also investigating a method of 3D prototyping the models to a smaller, more reproducible copy.
Links:
3D Scanner Technology
IDIA, in partnership with the BSU School of Nursing, developed and launched a new Nursing Interview Simulator in the virtual world of Blue Mars. Blue Mars is a next generation and high fidelity virtual world that uses the CryEngine game engine. Student nurses practice interviews via role-playing – using avatars with predefined health histories.
The Virtual Middletown Living Museum project in Blue Mars is a simulation of the Ball Glass factory from early 20th century Muncie, Indiana. Life and conditions in the factory were one of the key elements of the Middletown Studies by Robert S. and Helen Merrell Lynd in their landmark studies Middletown (1929) and Middletown in Transition (1937). These in-depth accounts of life in Muncie, Indiana, became classic sociological studies and established the community as a barometer of social trends in the United States. In the years since, scholars in a variety of fields have returned to Muncie to follow up on the Lynds’ work, making this small city among the most studied communities in the nation. The center continues this tradition by sponsoring and promoting research on Muncie as Middletown, on small cities generally, and on the themes and issues the Lynds explored.
This simulation of industrial life, built as a prototype for a much larger project dealing with all aspects of the Lynd Study, has aimed to create an virtual living museum experience expanding the opportunities for both learning and interpretation. The approach to interactive design embeds learning and navigation experiences subtly into the project to maintain the sense of immersion. IDIA has prototyped several techniques to do this including: interactive objects that allow for close up inspection; objects that when clicked bring up web resources that show information; plans or photographs used in the interpretation; non-player character factory workers, a live interactive avatar of Frank C. Ball who greets visitors and introduces them to the factory; video and audio files of factory experts and archival films; an in-world interactive Heads-Up-Display (HUD) that provides deeper investigation and navigation through the factory; and a supporting webpage with complete documentation on all resources used in this interpretation.
To download the Blue Mars client, create an account and tour Virtual Middletown, please visit: http://blink.bluemars.com/City/IDIA_IDIALabExhibitions/
Follow these steps to get set up:
NOTE: If you are a Macintosh user (OS X) you may run the BlueMars client and Virtual Middletown virtual world using the Boot Camp emulation: http://www.apple.com/support/bootcamp/
Here are links for additional information on the project:
Recommended settings: Very High Graphics with good graphics cards – otherwise High or Low as needed. Screen resolution: Minimum 1280 by 720 or higher. Sound levels should be up. Many objects in the world are interactive – anything that highlights blue can be clicked with the left mouse button and examined – or might can reference a web page. The heads up display in the lower right hand corner provides information and navigation to augment your visit.
Project partners: The Center for Middletown Studies, Library Services and the Emerging Media Initiative at Ball State University
Press release: http://www.bsu.edu/news/article/0,1370,7273-850-65401,00.html
Ball State University’s Institute for Digital Intermedia Arts (IDIA) in Blue Mars is a large scale virtual simulation that showcases re-creations of artifacts and artworks in their original historical contexts, including sculptures at the 1915 Panama-Pacific International Exposition in San Francisco and a centuries-old Buddha at a Japanese temple. Through the use of such emerging technologies, visitors to Blue Mars can virtually experience these important but long lost sites.
IDIA’s simulations in Blue Mars present several examples of recent grant-supported research projects. IDIA is exploring various new ways that it might be used, from learning and the arts to gaming. Future IDIA initiatives in Blue Mars will include the prototyping the 3D internet, shared media collaboration tools and the development of an open virtual campus for use by educators interested in engaging the platform as an environment for learning.
Videos on IDIA Lab Youtube Channel
http://www.youtube.com/user/IDIALab#p/u
Images on IDIA Lab Flickr Photostream
http://www.flickr.com/photos/idia_lab/
This release of IDIA Lab introduces the following new features and updates, including
• Heads up Display system – flash-based HUD system displaying dynamic information and map based teleportation
• Automated avatar/bot greeter system
• A guided tour vehicle – launching from the orientation island
• The Snow Globe, a virtual winter simulation – employing physics, environment and particle systems. Teleports are placed throughout the City
• Depth of Field – now enabled in most environments • New navigation and orientation system
• New vegetation design – new plants with LOD
• High fidelity statues using advanced mapping techniques
• High optimization, terrain painting, parallax mapping
• Please use Very High Graphics settings to view
Blue Mars Builds
The IDIA Lab
THE INSTITUTE FOR DIGITAL INTERMEDIA ARTS is a collaborative research and design studio exploring the intersections between art, science and technology. We consult, design and produce immersive experiences for virtual reality, hybrid worlds, simulations, visualizations, games and interfaces for various platforms and devices. For more information, please visit IDIALAB.org. You can walk to all simulations or alternatively use the teleport columns you see at each location. Follow us on Twitter @ IDIA_Lab for news and updates.
Panama-Pacific International Exposition Simulation
IDIA simulation of the 1915 San Francisco Panama – Pacific Exposition The project allows for visitors to travel to the past to immersively tour a recreation of an historic environment that no longer exists. The exposition celebrated the opening of the Panama Canal but also San Francisco’s recovery from the devastating earthquake of 1906. IDIA 3D laser-scanned two sculptures by artist Adolph Weinman that have been included in this simulation and were originally installed on top of tall columns in the Court of the Universe. A more detailed examination of the sculptures can be found in our Museum Simulator. Visitors can change the time of day near controls found near this sign and the Fine Arts Palace to experience the lighting design of this exposition.
Palace of Fine Arts
The Palace of Fine Arts in the Marina District of San Francisco, California was originally constructed for the 1915 Panama-Pacific Exposition. One of a handful of surviving structures from the Exposition, it is the still situated on its original site. It was rebuilt in 1965 – and renovation of the lagoon, walkways, and a seismic retrofit were completed in early 2009. IDIA Lab constructed this as an addition to its Panama- Pacific Court of the Universe simulation.
Art Museum Simulation
Using blue prints, photographs, laser-scanning and measurements, IDIA Lab simulated an actual museum gallery to a high degree of accuracy for exploration and study within a live 3D environment. This goals of this build were to provide visitors with a remote immersive experience of an actual exhibition as it was installed – closely replicating all original factors such as the layout, framing and lighting of the physical space. Additional information is provided by touching each canvas or sculpture in the exhibition. Via a simulation such as this, curators can also spatially archive a show or prototype layout, lighting, and installation design.
Byodo-In Temple (Amida Hall)
Amida Hall, the most famous building in the Byodo-in temple complex was constructed in 1053 and is the only remaining building from the original site. Additional buildings making up the compound were burnt down during a civil war in 1336. IDIA scanned an Amida Buddha and created this temple site to give visitors an understanding of a typical context in which the Buddha was observed. A replica of the temple was also constructed on the island of O’ahu in Hawai’i. Nearby there are 360º immersion spheres of the Hawaiian temple that avatars can also explore.
Relic Temple
Relic Temple – located in the Ji Le Temple complex – Nangang District in Harbin, China.The Relic Temple simulation was built by by IDIA Lab as part of our larger 3D Laser Scanning and Simulation Project, including the 1915 Panama Pacific Exposition in San Francisco, Byodo-In Temple in Japan and the Bingling Si Buddhist Cave site – all simulated here on IDIA Lab in Blue Mars.
Shafer Tower
Shafer Tower is a 150-foot-tall (46 m) bell tower with a chiming clock and carillon bells located in the middle of the campus of Ball State University. A small staircase in the tower leads to a control room of the carillon, which has 48 custom-made bells. This virtual tower chimes when an avatar approaches – as does the bell in a smaller temple at our Byodo-in build.
The Snow Globe
Winter themed landscape simulation including environment, weather, particle and physics systems.
The IDIA has assembled an interdisciplinary group of students, faculty and industry experts in a significant interactive information portal for the Ball State University Museum of Art (BSUMA). The IDIA team is developing an innovative touch-based interface to navigate the collection, employing and integrating Microsoft Surface with the Museum’s database. The Surface will afford Museum patrons a collaborative, participatory public platform through which to access metadata and media of the physical exhibition – as well as extending virtually into the permanent collection. Using the Digital Images Delivered Online (DIDO) database, the interface will make visual the interconnection between works in the collection queried on searchable parameters, i.e. artist, medium, period, subject etc. This two-semester immersive project supported by the BSU Provost’s Immersion Initiative has been team-taught and has recruited students from targeted disciplines across campus.
Complete Instruction Guide here: http://ilocker.bsu.edu/users/idiaa/world_shared/SurfaceInstructions.pdf
Microsoft Surface represents a fundamental change in the potential for interaction with digital content. The Surface is a 30” tabletop interface environment that allows several people to work independently or collaboratively – all without using a mouse or a keyboard. The Surface allows users to navigate information physically, and manipulate information with natural gestures and touch http://www.microsoft.com/SURFACE/product.html#section=The%20Product.
The Ball State University Museum of Art has a collection of nearly 11,000 works of art. Central to the Ball State University Museum of Art’s mission is the provision of educational programming that will further faculty, staff, student, and public utilization and understanding of the Museum and its collection, of museums in general, and of the arts. To accomplish this goal, the Museum offer tours, talks, materials for teachers, an education database, artist demonstrations. The Museum’s education philosophy centers on bringing together the needs of visitors and the resources of the Museum , and balancing responsibility to the university with service to the community. In facilitating communication between the work of art and the viewer, the Museum subscribes to a philosophy of learner-centered programming informed by a thorough knowledge of the collection and methods and strategies for effective teaching.
Although the Museum’s collection numbers nearly 11,000, given the physical constraints of the facility, a mere 10% of the collected works are currently displayed at any given time. The incorporation of this hybrid Surface and database system will afford patrons virtual access to the entire collection – making visible those works currently stored. More importantly, the system will allow patrons to visualize the interconnectivity of the works according to multiple facets – visually re-contextualizing the works in relation to specified search parameters. This form of innovative technology within a museum context would typically be installed at major metropolitan institutions. Development of this interface at the Ball State University Museum of Art will not only benefit local community groups and patrons of BSUMA whose access to the collection will be significantly augmented, but also has the potential to influence other museums through the distribution of the outcomes of this product.
The Institute for Digital Intermedia Arts (IDIA) has a history of providing interdisciplinary immersion and new media experiences, employing pedagogy that supports students’ transformation as active, engaged learners. The Institute provides a dynamic exchange between instructor and students – where participants engage in collaborative, inquiry-based communities that provide an environment, which fosters participatory learning. As opposed to a traditional model, where knowledge is imparted by the teacher to the student, participatory learning can transform the learner into an active role. Participatory learning communities engage in a dynamic conversation centered around a subject – where analysis, comparison, and evaluation are core to the process of acquiring meaning and relationships. This environment allows students the opportunity to have a stake in the conditions of their learning, making decisions that direct their course of investigation. With a commitment to active inquiry, participants are freed to create personal and collective meaning.
BSU MUSEUM OF ART
COLLECTION PORTAL
SOFTWARE DESIGN
Carrie Arnold
Joel Happ
Garret Orth
Deekshita Reddy
Christopher Ross
Jonathan Strong
Austin Toombs
INTERFACE DESIGN
Anastasia Goryacheva
Steven Lanier
Jonathan Strong
ELECTRONICS
Eric Brockmeyer
Giovanni Rozzi
GRAPHIC DESIGN
Amy Goettemoeller
Ina-Marie Henning
FACULTY
Jesse Allison
John Fillwalk
Paul Gestwicki
PROJECT DIRECTOR
Jonathan Strong
A SPECIAL THANK YOU
UNIVERSITY LIBRARIES
James Bradley
John Straw
Budi Wibowo
SOUND
Rick Baker
Steven Lanier
Giovanni Rozzi
STRUCTURAL DESIGN
Eric Brockmeyer
Matthew Wolak
PROJECT MANAGEMENT
Ina-Marie Henning
Amruta Mhaiskar
Jennifer Weaver-Cotton
PRODUCER/PRINCIPLE INVESTIGATOR
John Fillwalk
BALL STATE UNIVERSITY MUSEUM OF ART
Peter Blume
Carl Schafer
Tania Said
Ball State University Museum of Art
College of Fine Arts
College of Architecture and Planning
Department of Architecture
Department of Art
Department of Computer Science
School of Music
Information Technology
O ffice of the Provost
University Libraries
and
Jeff Berg, IBM Interactive, IDIA Research Fellow
IDIA Presents: BSU MUSEUM OF ART COLLECTION PORTAL 3/20/11 at 2:30pm BSUMA
BSU MUSEUM OF ART COLLECTION PORTAL
Reception and Gallery Talk
Thursday, March 20 @ 2:30pm, BSU Museum of Art
The BSU Museum of Art Collection Portal was developed by students, faculty and industry research fellows in the Institute for Digital Intermedia Arts at Ball State University. The year-long project was developed in partnership with the Ball State University Museum of Art and sponsored by the Provost’s Immersive Learning Initiative.
This interdisciplinary team from art, computer science, architecture and music has developed an innovative, touch-based application to navigate the collection. The portal bridges the Microsoft Surface interface with the Museum’s collection database, the Digital Images Delivered Online (DIDO), hosted on the Digital Media Repository of Bracken Library. The Surface affords Museum visitors an interactive platform to individually or collaboratively make virtual connections between works of art both on display and in reserve – accessing information and media across the collection.
Complete Instruction Guide here: http://ilocker.bsu.edu/users/idiaa/world_shared/SurfaceInstructions.pdf
The Twitter Cloud is a visualization of real time Tweets (messages) posted on Twitter.com. The system automatically scans specified user feeds, and visualizes new messages as they arrive. This piece was programmed in Java using the Processing API.
This project was also linked with the Tweet Station so users could be identified with RFID and allowed to post their own messages through a touchscreen kiosk. In the context below, conference attendees entered their Twitter feeds to be tracked so that others could read about their experiences as they posted from their laptops and phones. The Twitter Cloud visualizer has also been used within virtual worlds – both as a live event Tweet tracker, and to track and visualize avatars as they traveled to various locations within the world.
IDIA is creating a media rich interactive digital kiosk for the Digital Fabrication Institute’s MMFX Exhibit hosted by the Indianapolis Museum of Art. Students participating in the IDIA Immersion Seminar in Virtual Worlds are developing the interactive interface, which will act as a station within the exhibit where viewers can attain additional biographical and portfolio information– employing a custom designed, coded and fabricated dynamic media experience.
Using our MakerBot Replicator 2X 3D printer, IDIA’s Chris Harrison worked with David Rodriguez to create a family of 3 brackets with varying uses and advantages to mount a Leap Motion Controller to the front of an Oculus Rift DK2.
Finding that double sided tape was not doing a very effective job of holding the Leap Motion Controller in place, we looked around Makerbot’s Thingiverse, an online warehouse of 3D print-ready objects, for a solution.
We found a bracket which when printed didn’t quite meet the tolerances of the Leap’s dimensions, and so some slight modifications were made to better accommodate it. In addition, rather than the 2-piece configuration on the website, a new bracket was made to be printed in one single pass.
Finally, after realizing other potential uses for the Leap, 2 more brackets were designed and printed so that the Leap can be securely installed onto the Oculus in a total of 3 different configurations.
The brackets can be viewed and downloaded here:
Bracket 1 Straight bracket used for visual IR passthrough from Leap camera
Bracket 2 Straight bracket used to minimize Oculus IR emitter occlusion
Bracket 3 Angles backet used to track hands with best angle – if no passthrough is desired
View a Oculus / Leap project here: https://idialab.org/oculus-rift-and-leap-motion-demo/
